Archive By Author -

WASHINGTON - A woman found in her home with the decomposing bodies of her four daughters was suspected by a social worker of holding one of the girls hostage as early as April, city officials said Friday.

A Portal family lost their home Thursday to a house fire possibly caused by a faulty surge protector. Portal Fire Chief Christopher Ivey said the fire originated in a child's bedroom and the surge protector is likely the cause. However, the investigation is ongoing, he said.

MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. - About a dozen senior campaign staffers for Rudy Giuliani are forgoing their January paychecks, a sign of possible money trouble for the Republican presidential candidate and last year's national front-runner.

WASHINGTON - Residents of at least 17 states are suddenly stuck in the middle of a fight between the Bush administration and state governments over post-Sept. 11 security rules for driver's licenses - a dispute that, by May, could leave millions of people unable to use their licenses to board planes or enter federal buildings.

BAGHDAD, Iraq - One of the largest bombing campaigns of the war destroyed extremists' ''defensive belts'' south of Baghdad, allowing American soldiers to push into areas where they have not been in years, a top commander said Friday.

(Note: All information included in this report is taken from law enforcement incident reports and arrest records, which are public records and available for review at any and all local law enforcement agencies. Not every arrest leads to a conviction. Guilt or innocence is determined by the court system.)

CHARLOTTE, N.C. - Bank of America said Friday it will buy Countrywide Financial for $4.1 billion in stock, a deal that rescues the country's biggest mortgage lender and expands the financial services empire of the nation's largest consumer bank.

NEW YORK - Founded in the mid-19th century, the Young Men's Christian Association has expanded far beyond its name in the United States. It welcomes all faiths, half the 20.2 million people it serves are female, and more than half are adults.

Cold, slushy weather crawled across much of the U.S. on Monday, coating parts of several Southern states in snow, leaving highways dangerously icy in numerous states from New Mexico to Oklahoma to New England, and sending temperatures plunging to 25 to 30 degrees below normal across much of the country.

ATLANTA - The daughter of the lone woman on Georgia's death row is asking the state parole board to grant her mother life in prison instead of the death penalty for plotting to have her father killed - even though she says her dad's death was "the most painful experience of my life."

ATLANTA - A panel studying Georgia's rural health issues on Monday recommended a pilot program pairing four hospitals with other providers in their area, creating a "hub and spoke" model aimed at cutting down on expensive emergency room visits to struggling hospitals.

FALL RIVER, Mass. - Two women who cleaned the home of former New England Patriots player Aaron Hernandez testified Monday at his murder trial that they saw guns stashed in three places in his house before the killing.